By Madyson Montoya — Managing Editor
Maybe it was the love in the air on the Valentine’s Day meet or the nerves are finally wearing off.
Either way, the dual meet against Alaska Anchorage was not only San Jose State gymnastic’s best showing, but full of career-high scores.
The Spartans beat the Seawolves 195.025-192.125. Who knows, this can likely be a turning point that the team needs this year.
SJSU won every event and a Spartan took first place in each apparatus as well.
With the season now halfway over, it is crunch time and this meet’s success has the potential to push the Spartans to another conference title.
Let’s take a look at what made SJSU break multiple ceilings in one night.
It just clicked
As far as team success goes, the 2020 season has not been rough, but it has been inconsistent.
“Everybody needs to step up on the same day together,” said head coach Joanne Bowers. “That is the only way we are going to be successful.”
That is exactly what the Spartans did with this dual meet. Out of all 20 routines, SJSU only had to count a 0.1 deduction.
It was clear that there was much more comfort with each event and that ultimately resulted in better scores all around.
Bars becoming back pocket
The second rotation was the bars, which has been a tough event for the Spartans, especially last week against UC Davis. The bars was the Spartans’ second highest scored event of the meet.
Freshman Jada Mazury earned a career high score of 9.900 on the bars, followed by fellow freshman Emma Milne with a 9.825.
“All my hard work in practice paid off and it’s finally coming through,” Mazury said. “I hope I can do it again.”
No falls occurred during the rotation, but Alaska simply did not have the difficulty to be competitive within the event.
Personal records
Senior Taylor Chan has made her name a familiar one when it comes to SJSU gymnastic meets. She is known for her 9.9 floor routines and last week earned her second career 9.925.
For the first time in her career, Chan scored a 9.950 on floor. It marked the third highest score in program history.
Just before the floor rotation was the beam, where junior Nikki Duggan made her event debut for the first time in her three seasons at SJSU.
Duggan is known for strictly competing in bars but her first beam routine not only hit, but won the event with a 9.800.
“I’ve trained for this and I knew going into this ‘I got it,’” Duggan said. “I was just breathing the whole time and I didn’t even hear anyone.”
Bowers is looking forward to practice this week as she knows her team has finally got the confidence and reassurance that they have been needing this season.
Up next is an away meet at Seattle Pacific on Friday at 7 p.m.
Follow Madyson on Twitter @MadysonMontoya
